In 2000, conservatives were obligated to explain why they supported
preservation of the Electoral College even though it produced a victory
for their candidate, George W. Bush. In coming elections, their devotion
may face a sterner test: Will they favor it if Democrats win the White
House even when Republicans carry the popular vote?
Mitt Romney managed to avoid that problem by coming up short across the board. But while Republicans have noticed that the voting public is changing in ways that don't help the GOP, they may not have noticed that the electoral map has also shifted to their clear disadvantage.
Nate Silver, who does the "FiveThirtyEight" blog for The New York Times and correctly predicted the outcome in all 50 states, noted afterward that Obama would have gotten a second term even if Romney had tied him in the popular vote.
In fact, he wrote, "Romney may have had to win the national popular vote by three percentage points on Tuesday to be assured of winning the Electoral College." No Republican has done that since George H.W. Bush in 1988.
Texas A&M political scientist George Edwards III, author of "Why the Electoral College Is Bad for America," finds additional grounds for the GOP to worry. "With Obama's victory," he told me by email, "Democrats have now won 18 states -- the 'blue wall' -- for at least the past six consecutive elections. That's the most states Democrats have won consecutively for that often since the formation of the modern party system in 1828."
He went on: "Those 18 blue-wall states (joined by the District of Columbia) now provide Democrats 242 electoral college votes" -- just 28 shy of the 270 needed to win. Republicans are swimming upstream.
So maybe they'll reassess this antique. Democrats got all the convincing they needed in 2000, when Al Gore won the popular vote to no avail. Republicans shouldn't wait till it happens to them.
Read more: http://townhall.com/columnists/stevechapman/2012/11/15/electoral_college_is_democratic_not_democratic
Mitt Romney managed to avoid that problem by coming up short across the board. But while Republicans have noticed that the voting public is changing in ways that don't help the GOP, they may not have noticed that the electoral map has also shifted to their clear disadvantage.
Nate Silver, who does the "FiveThirtyEight" blog for The New York Times and correctly predicted the outcome in all 50 states, noted afterward that Obama would have gotten a second term even if Romney had tied him in the popular vote.
In fact, he wrote, "Romney may have had to win the national popular vote by three percentage points on Tuesday to be assured of winning the Electoral College." No Republican has done that since George H.W. Bush in 1988.
Texas A&M political scientist George Edwards III, author of "Why the Electoral College Is Bad for America," finds additional grounds for the GOP to worry. "With Obama's victory," he told me by email, "Democrats have now won 18 states -- the 'blue wall' -- for at least the past six consecutive elections. That's the most states Democrats have won consecutively for that often since the formation of the modern party system in 1828."
He went on: "Those 18 blue-wall states (joined by the District of Columbia) now provide Democrats 242 electoral college votes" -- just 28 shy of the 270 needed to win. Republicans are swimming upstream.
So maybe they'll reassess this antique. Democrats got all the convincing they needed in 2000, when Al Gore won the popular vote to no avail. Republicans shouldn't wait till it happens to them.
Read more: http://townhall.com/columnists/stevechapman/2012/11/15/electoral_college_is_democratic_not_democratic
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